If you already have a pair of simple foam speaker platforms, you can improve their performance simply by gluing a heavy floor tile to the top. Ordinary contact adhesive works fine for this. Then you can either glue some kitchen mat to the upper surface, to provide some grip, or use Blu–Tack, as discussed earlier, between the tile and the loudspeaker.

There you have it; the basics of why you should consider stands for your bookshelf speakers. As with much in hi-fi, this is only the introduction to a massive subject, but it serves as a good understanding of stands function and what they can do for your hi-fi system. And they can do a lot for providing your speakers with the optimal condition for top-notch performance.

And, of course, it needs to put the speaker in the correct position relative to the listener, which usually means with the tweeter aimed at an imaginary point just behind the listener’s head. Note, though, that a few speakers are deliberately designed to be aimed directly ahead rather than at the listener, so always check the recommendations in the manual that comes with your particular loudspeaker before directing them inwards.

One way to improve the situation is to add mass by means of a platform fixed to the top surface of the foam. Primacoustic do this in their Recoil Stabilizer by using a very thick steel slab with rubber matting on top, while Auralex and other companies use MDF topped with dense rubber on their more up–market platforms. IsoAcoustics take yet a different approach, by using a frame made from rigid components joined by resilient isolators.

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The SLX Series is a professional quality stand which caters for larger bookshelf speakers where an increase in the footprint is required to ensure optimum stability.

That’s where you need to put the sub. If your sub has a phase adjustment knob, or a polarity–invert switch, adjust this until you hear the loudest result from frequencies around the crossover point, typically 80 to 120 Hz.